Did You Know That You Can Really Buy Richard Castle’s Nikki Heat Books?

by Christina Gleason on June 18, 2013

Do you love to watch ABC’s Castle with Nathan Fillion and Stana Katic? As a writer, I can honestly say it’s my favorite show on TV right now. As my brother summed it up for me the other day, “I know I need to watch it. I mean, he helps solve crimes by English majoring at them!” (My brother graduated from college with a degree in English last year.) I didn’t watch Castle from the start. It conflicted with other things we were already watching. But right before we cancelled Netflix, we got caught up on Seasons 1-4 on DVD. What a great decision that was.
Nathan Fillion as Richard Castle

When we cancelled Netflix, we started going to the public library more often. And about that time, I saw something online that completely intrigued me. But first, some video clips:

For the Kate Beckett + Richard Castle fans – also known as Caskett fans – here’s a clip from when they finally got together at the end of Season 4.

For those with a few more minutes, I found another great Castle video, this one filled with LOL moments.

Okay. Now that we got that out of the way.

You can actually read the books written by Richard Castle. They really published them. Nathan Fillion’s picture is on the book jacket and everything. There is speculation concerning who the ghost writer is, which just adds to the fun of the mystery. And, as Castle fans, we obviously love both mysteries and fun!

So yeah, you can read all of the books that the character Richard Castle has published on the show. I’m going to make it easy for you by providing the links to buy them on Amazon. I get a small commission if you buy; consider it my “tip” for sharing this information!

Now, I’m not going to say that these books are great literature. That would be a lie. As an author, the character of Richard Castle is a bit of a hack. I’d put him on par with Stephanie Meyer – not a great writer, but able to attract tens of thousands of readers. The aliases he comes up with for each of the people in his life are totally uninspired and completely obvious, although it makes it easy to read the dialogue with the actors’ voices in your head. If you watch the TV show, which would arguably be the only reason to read the book series, you’ll notice that most of the things that happen with Nikki Heat and Jameson Rook (I see what he did there!) are things that happened to Castle and Beckett. In the reality of the TV show, Richard Castle has very few original ideas, and instead only fictionalizes things that happened to him. In our reality, so many of these things are fan service, nods to us as readers by incorporating memorable parts of the TV show.

The books were highly entertaining to me, and I’m pretty sure I laughed out loud at some parts. Definitely good “summer reads,” suitable for reading on the beach. The easy style of writing, compelling characters, and familiar antics made each book hard for me to put down. Deadly Heat isn’t coming out for a few months, as of the time I write this blog post, but I’m definitely looking forward to reading it. Like the end of season 4 of Castle, the fourth book in the series ends on a cliffhanger.

Since we have to wait until fall for the next season to start up, you can get your Castle fix through the written word!

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How to Survive a Therapeutic Soak

by Christina Gleason on June 17, 2013

So you have [insert name of physical illness here] and it’s been decided that you should take a nice bath to soak away what ails you. There’s a cliche about moms wishing they had time for a nice, hot bath to relax, but when you find yourself facing about half an hour in the tub each and every night for a therapeutic soak, you start wishing instead for a bathtub where you can submerge your knees and your shoulders at the same time. So here are some survival tips for those long hours you’re about to spend in a tub full of water.

Buy stock in whatever you’re meant to be soaking in.

I’m “lucky” enough that my feel better bath is made with Epsom salt. A pound a day of Epsom salt. It says two cups per bath, but what they really mean is half the two-pound package. We’ve found some at Walmart for 44 cents a pounds. Maybe one of the warehouse stores will have it cheaper, because that still works out to $160.60 per year. Oh, and when you run out, it’s nice to have a significant other who can run to the store and buy more for you.

Epsom Salt Vanna Pose

Put your hair up.

If you have hair that comes down past the base of your skull, you’ll need to put your hair up. A simple ponytail won’t work, because that will put an awkward crick in your neck when you try to lean your head back against the wall of the tub. So you either go for the ’80s-style ponytail high atop your head, or you opt for a stylish scarf. I’m ready for my close-up, Mr. Demille.

Hair Scarf Closeup

Find just the right temperature.

If the doctor said, “As hot as you can handle it,” you crank that temperature dial up to one step below lobster. If, on the other hand, you need to take a warm bath because a hot bath that raises your body temperature will cause you to get overheated and sap every last bit of strength you have, you sit in that tub while it’s filling up so you can fine tune that bad boy so you don’t look like you spent a whole day out in the desert sun without sunscreen.

Overheated Face

Figure out how not to be bored out of your skull.

My physical stuff comes with a side of Asperger’s, anxiety, and depression, so too much time alone with nothing to do but think is a bad thing. My arms and shoulders often need to soak with the rest of me, and there’s no ledge on the inside of my tub to balance one of those tub caddies on anyways, so I need a completely hands-off form of entertainment. I found that my local public library allows you to borrow audiobook titles and listen to them on various mobile devices. So far, I’ve listened to eight short stories from the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes collection by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and now I’m onto a fascinating novel by Garth Nix called A Confusion of Princes. Of course, if you’re into that kind of thing, you can always partake of 50 Shades of Grey, as read by Gilbert Gottfried…

Have a good bath!

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A Photo I Call: Chronic Illness is Fun

by Christina Gleason on June 15, 2013

Chronic Illness is Fun

© 2013 Christina Gleason.

All rights reserved. You may share with image with proper attribution and a link back to this page.

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The Importance of Global Vaccinations: An FAQ for the Anti-Vaccine Crowd

by Christina Gleason on June 6, 2013

When I became a Shot@Life Champion, I did so because I believe it is important to give kids around the world a fighting chance at life. Shot@Life – an initiative of the United Nations – helps provide vaccinations against polio, rotavirus, measles, and pneumonia for children worldwide. So I started sharing information from my Shot@Life training,  and I couldn’t believe some of the pushback I got from the anti-vaccination crowd. So I thought I’d put together a handy little Q&A cheat sheet so I don’t have to type up my responses to the same questions/criticisms every time. Yes, I’m calling this an FAQ, even though not everything is technically a question.

Line up for immunizations

Don’t vaccinations cause autism?

No. They don’t. The study that started this horrible misinformation was a fraudulent study conducted by Andrew Wakefield. Data was falsified in his 1998 study. Wakefield’s co-authors withdrew their names when they discovered he’d been paid over 435,000 GBP ($674,000) by lawyers who planned to sue vaccine manufacturers. And boy, did their investment pay off. The vaccine scare his sham of a study created drummed up plenty of business for personal injury lawyers. Of course, all of those kids who didn’t get vaccinated because of the scare ended up causing an outbreak of measles in the UK. A definitive study has proven that a full vaccine schedule has no bearing on whether or not a child has autism.

But vaccines do hurt people! They’re poison!

I can’t think of a single thing on Earth that is 100% safe. We need water to live, and yet we can drown in it, or even die of water poisoning! Sadly, yes, there can be a bad batch of vaccines – just like there can be bad batches of lifesaving antibiotics – and some people are prone to having terrible reactions to some of the substances used in vaccines. But let’s look at the data from a purely objective perspective: numbers.

A total of 14,629 cases of vaccine injury were reported from 1988-2013, a 25-year period. This includes cases that were dismissed as groundless. In 2008, one year alone, nearly 8.8 million children under the age of 5 died of vaccine-preventable illnesses. To put that into perspective, over 600 times as many children died from illnesses that could have been prevented with a vaccine in a single year than there were vaccine injuries – most of which were not fatal – in 25 years. That is a 15,000:1 ratio of children vaccines could have saved versus vaccines that harmed anyone in any way. The odds are in favor of saving lives, not ruining them.

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Wordless Wednesday – Eerie Orange Sky After Last Week’s Storm

by Christina Gleason on June 5, 2013

Eerie Orange Sky

Photo taken May 29, 2013 after severe thunderstorms with a tornado warning blew through.

© 2013 Christina Gleason. All rights reserved.

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My New Favorite Cork Bathmat – A Review and Giveaway

by Christina Gleason on June 4, 2013

Sometimes, a company contacts you for a product review, and you’re like, “What could I possibly use…?” When Karma Kiss wanted to set me up with their blog review and affiliate program – yes, that means I get commission from the links below – I was disappointed that the three items I said I’d like to review were not available for review. I got a list of reviewable items to choose from, and I said, “What the heck? Why not a bathmat?”

Why not, indeed!

If your family is like mine, you use some form of towel as a bathmat, something that gets wadded up on the bathroom floor after baths and showers and never really quite dries. So it stinks. And even after washing it, it still stinks.

Enter: My New Favorite  Cork Bathmat

Thirsty Floor Mat

Cork, you say? Yes. Cork. The Thirsty Cork Floor Mat has changed the way I look at bath mats forever. (Never letting a nasty, wet towel get wadded up on the floor again!)

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This is My Cloak and This is My Scepter

by Christina Gleason on May 29, 2013

May I present to you Her Royal Highness Christina with her dashing cloak and scepter?

Cloak and Scepter

I’ve had a rough couple of weeks, both physically and emotionally. This picture was taken on the night of the worst Chronic Fatigue Syndrome flareup I’ve ever had. Despite the fact that I brought my cane for support, I nearly collapsed in the middle of the grocery store because my legs were so weak. My cane, the skull-tipped “scepter” in the picture above, was something I’d bought as a costume prop a few years ago when I went to Comic Con as a Rogue Trader Captain. Turns out it’s actually sturdy enough to bear my weight, which I discovered one day this past winter after deciding I needed to have something to support me instead of crawling up the stairs. My “cloak” is a fuzzy fleece blanket I got from one of the first two Disney Social Media Moms conferences, which comforts me when I’m feeling awful. I’d been joking with Tom that they were my cloak and scepter, and I was amused by the juxtaposition of the skull cane and the Soft Kitty shirt, so I asked him to take a picture of me. He didn’t like the first “I am smiling” picture, so he asked me to try to smile bigger – because he knew I would hate the other pic – and this is what I could muster.

Until recently, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome was a mild thing for me. I had some pretty strict limits on the amount of activity I could do, but I’d worked myself up to being able to job half a mile on my Wii Fit a few months ago, and I was able to go out and do things like a normal person most of the time.

Then it got worse. Much worse. Very quickly.

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Are You an Emotional Gladiator?

by Christina Gleason on May 21, 2013

After a tearful therapy session today, my psychiatrist told me I’m an emotional gladiator. We were discussing the vast topic of loss – not just death, but failed relationships and the loss of much of my independence due to physical and cognitive issues over the past year. I’ve been mourning the loss of my ability to do all of the things I used to be able to do – like working full time or walking without a cane – but he told me, after reading my 4,000+ word essay on loss I wrote for him, that he admires how strong of a fight I’m putting up to do anything. He re-framed it for me, that I could have given up, given in to my ailments, told my clients I’m closing up shop and applied for Social Security Disability. (I would qualify if I wasn’t lucky enough to have my freelance clients.) But even though it’s hard, and I feel like giving up sometimes, I’m still in the fight.

Gladiator

I get why Katherine Stone calls all of us in her Postpartum Progress community warrior moms. We fight depression and other mental health issues. We fight stigma. We fight being judged for every little decision we make. We fight our own thoughts of guilt, worthlessness, and doubt.

We fight.

I’m in the arena, and I’ve taken a lot of hits. But I’m not done yet. There’s been no thumbs down signaling it’s over. I’ll fight even when I’m too weak to stand. I’ll fight even when I’m sure I’m doomed. I’ll fight even though I’m sick and tired of fighting. Because the alternative is unacceptable to me.

What’s your fight?

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On Death and Loss

by Christina Gleason on May 20, 2013

My therapist asked me to do a homework assignment for him before my next appointment, which is tomorrow. So of course, I left it until today. The subject is loss, which is hard for me to talk about because I get choked up on my tears. So I write, and then we discuss. I’ve spent a great deal of emotion on this essay I’ve been writing, so I decided to share part of it with you. My memories of past events may not be entirely accurate, but this is how I remember things.

Death

I was 11 years old when my paternal grandfather died. It was February school vacation time when my dad got a call saying his dad had had a stroke and it wasn’t looking good. The cost of flying him down to Florida alone was prohibitive, so my parents decided to pack the three kids in the car and drive down together. When we got to his hospital room, we thought we had the wrong room. The man in the bed looked nothing like the grandpa I knew. I burst into tears when we learned it really was him. He was so gaunt and sickly, and he had these terrible, loud hiccups that shook his entire body. If he hadn’t been in a coma, they would have been so painful. I refused to visit him again the entire week we were there because it upset me so much. When it was time to leave for home, I did say goodbye to him.

We stopped at a hotel that first night, and my dad had to go to the lobby to use the pay phone to check in with my grandma. I’ll never forget how he looked when he opened the door to the hotel room with his face all red and his eyes streaming with tears. Grandpa had held on until we said goodbye, and then he let go. We all cried and piled onto each other in a hug.

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Roleplaying in World of Warcraft as a Creative Writing Outlet: Meet Carisse Dawnfire

by Christina Gleason on May 17, 2013

I make no secret about the fact that I’m a gamer geek who loves to play World of Warcraft. It’s an outlet for many things, including a place to go when coping with my depression, anxiety, or the mental and physical symptoms of a CFS flareup. But it’s also great for my creativity as a writer; my favorite fiction genre is fantasy, and that’s what World of Warcraft is. There’s an aspect of gameplay in World of Warcraft that has very little to do with the game’s mechanics and everything to do with the world-building the creators have done. Roleplaying is completely optional, but there are entire servers (called “realms”) that specialize in roleplay, and players on these servers can really get into their characters.

I’d like you to meet my main character, Carisse Dawnfire.

Carisse Dawnfire in the Jade Forest

Carisse (kuh-REESE) is a Blood Elf mage. Back before the Catacylsm, and back before the Third War, she was Magistrix Carisse Dawnstar of Silvermoon City. But after the attack on the Sunwell that robbed her of her father and her sister, Carisse didn’t have the heart for politics anymore, and she took to traveling for a few years. Though she had a knack for it, the mercenary life was not for her. But that was how she met Elynxdria k’Shinar, known to friends as “Lynx,” and the two had remained friends even after leaving the merc company.

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